[November 22, Lunar Calendar October 22, Light Snow]
Today is one of the twenty-four solar terms, Light Snow, and it unexpectedly started snowing lightly here in Qinzhou.
I have already left ishu Village and left behind a large batch of dicinal herbs bought by my mother, as well as so food supplies.
This ti, while transporting the goods, I had to use the flatbed cart from ho multiple tis because there were so many items. I only discovered that if the door isn’t closed after opening, it can only remain open for three minutes.
Between the Deceit Dynasty and the modern era, there’s a pitch-black area three steps wide, and when the door is forcibly closed, if I’m closer to one side, I’ll be pushed to that side.
Moreover, after the door closes, it takes about thirty minutes before it can be opened again for a second ti.
Previously, I would open the door once, pass through, and imdiately close it without carefully verifying. Now, I’ve supplented my understanding of the door’s rules.
In order to move the goods, I’ve exhausted all the trigram patterns in the Yansheng coin.
The villagers saw the dicinal herbs and food left in the empty house at the village entrance, and once again knelt in front of , as if kneeling was the only way to express their gratitude.
I didn’t wear a mask, and my Heart Lamp has strengthened significantly due to these villagers; the incense brought by the mask is also slowly increasing. As a rare female Night Traveler in the Evil Suppression Bureau, I seem to always gain incense from both ends.
The villagers’ gratitude towards directly becos my own incense, and their recognition of my identity as a Night Traveler allows the incense burner mask to release more incense to .
The balance between layers and the Heart Lamp shouldn’t be far off now.
For ishu Village, I’ve done all I can. Whether they can survive this harsh winter depends on them.
I hope everything will be peaceful, but I always think of the saying that misfortune specially targets those with hard lives.
The letters written by the villagers of ishu Village are heavy and burdenso; whenever I see them, I feel a bit short of breath.
They write letters to their sons and daughters working as forced laborers, and their daughters-in-law as well, mostly reporting good news and not bad, falsely claiming that they are doing well at ho, so the laborers need not worry about ho and should not flee due to concern, lest they lose their lives unnecessarily.
However, there are also a few elderly won who continuously lant their hardships at ho, crying and wailing on the ground as they dictate the letters, venting their anguish and fear, cursing and threatening in the letters, demanding their sons and daughters-in-law find a way to return, or else they’ll take their grandchildren and perish.
Yang Jisheng, faced with such elderly won, could only frown and continue writing, secretly omitting unpleasant words and changing them to comforting ones, adding a few lines at the end of the letter ’on his own initiative,’ advising against escaping.
I saw He Buning and others waiting at the crossroads; I’ll stop writing here for today.
...
[November 25, Lunar Calendar October 25, Overcast]
All the way with no major incidents, uh... can’t really say no major incidents,
I found that the financial-loss side effect of the Human Bone Dice is quite troubleso. After giving everything, including the clothes on my back, to Xia Chan, I also tried to avoid handling any fragile items.
It was peaceful for more than one day. Yesterday afternoon, the journey was too dull, and the Black Donkey was following the horse ahead on its own. I sat on the shaft of the cart and dozed off with my back against the carriage door.
When the donkey cart went over a big bump, it jolted up and I was about to fall to the ground. Fortunately, I reacted quickly and used my back to brace, otherwise, I would have certainly ended up with a bruised and swollen face and a fractured arm.
A fracture requires treatnt, and treatnt costs money—financial loss!
After this incident, I decided to take two or three coins from Xia Chan every day to keep on ; losing money is better than getting hurt, and after all, it’s only two or three coins, not much.
After three days of slow progress, we arrived at Shikeng Village this morning, which is essentially a huge quarry.
Shikeng Village is only half a day’s journey from Fengning City. Standing at the highest point of the quarry and looking towards the southwest, you can see a majestic city standing on the plains beneath the heavy clouds.
The ’Mountain’ squad of Night Travelers is stationed in Shikeng Village. The Golden Travel Captain, Elder Wu, is a small old man in his fifties, reminiscent of a Corpse Driver from Xiangxi.
Around the quarry, in shady spots, there are many coffins standing, which are filled with zombies cultivated by Elder Wu. They are responsible for the safety of the quarry and watch over the forced laborers working there to prevent their escape.
When He Buning inquired Elder Wu about the surrounding situation, I went to the quarry’s steward to deliver letters for the forced laborers from ishu Village.
Over a hundred n and more than fifty won from ishu Village were forcibly recruited. The n are all chiseling and transporting stone, while the won do laundry and cooking.
The conditions at the quarry are poor. It snowed a few days ago, making it cold, and most n are still wearing single-layer garnts and straw shoes, while the won use icy water for laundry and cleaning, subsisting on black bread buns.
In contrast, the foren, constables, and soldiers overseeing the quarry are all dressed warmly in cotton clothes and leather boots, with food, at, and vegetables, and occasionally even wine to fend off the cold.
It’s been only about ten months since they were forcibly recruited, yet one-third of the people from ishu Village have already died. Hu’er’s father, Bao Fu, died just last month.
All those who have died are collectively cremated, with no one attending to the remaining ashes and bones, all discarded behind the quarry on the mountainside.
Helplessly, I could only go to the back mountain to burn the letters for the deceased, hoping they could rest in peace upon seeing them.
Previously, I thought the people of Black Mountain Village had it hard. Now I realize that Black Mountain Village is quite fortunate. At least they have land to cultivate, food to eat, and are not forcibly recruited.
When I first entered Wangshan City, I thought that all places in the Deceit Dynasty were like there, where even though the common people were tired, their lives were relatively prosperous and happy, able to enjoy themselves and occasionally buy half a roast chicken.
Only after leaving Wangshan City did I witness the hardships of the common people under the feudal dynasty system.
At that mont, all the things I learned in history books materialized before my eyes, and an overwhelming sense of wanting to do sothing, yet feeling utterly powerless and clueless about where to start, arose within .
The Yansheng coin had so many previous owners who couldn’t accomplish certain things, so what chance do I have?
Whenever I feel this impulsive confusion, I just want to go ho, think of my mother.
...
[November 26, Lunar Calendar October 26, Heavy Snow]
The heavy snow makes traveling inadvisable, so we are temporarily staying in Fengning City.
In the reconstruction of Fengning City, the Evil Suppression Bureau was the first to be rebuilt. Despite having so many vacant residential courtyards, they chose to leave them empty rather than let the laborers repairing houses stay there.
Watching them huddle together on the roadside in the heavy snow, chewing on cold buns, filled with discomfort.
I invited them to take shelter from the snow indoors, yet they all knelt and prostrated themselves, pleading for rcy, saying they, as poor people, dared not defile the future official residences.
How absurd! How ignorant!
I stord off in anger, and even then they prostrated themselves behind , uttering words of gratitude.
Has this world gone mad?
He Buning is again reviewing the list of strange cases near Fengning City. The local Evil Suppression Bureau has already recruited a batch of Day Traveling Envoys, and people from nearby towns are gradually moving in, making it a busy ti.
I went to exchange for an ’Exorcism Red Candle,’ and besides the Human Bone Dice, I plan to ’send’ all future obtained items to Xia Chan promptly. The Human Bone Dice won’t lose itself, at least, I haven’t lost money recently, nor have I seen the dice go missing.
The dice likely lack ownership, as even Xia Chan can use them. The side effects attach to the user after use, unrelated to anyone else.
After Xia Chan and I returned to our temporary residence, he dragged Xuan Yu to play in the snow. Xia Chan remains carefree as ever.
Xuan Yu placed one paw into the snow and retracted it, afterwards refusing to step into the snow anymore, nestling into my arms without moving.
In the evening, the snow fell even harder, and I wondered how the people at the quarry, and villages like ishu Village, would endure the winter.
Nevertheless, not everything was distressing today. Xiao Liu, that big blabbermouth, found before I could find him.
Perhaps his Fifth Brother is too reserved, lacking any interest in gossip, causing Xiao Liu to suffer from this lack of outlet, so he brought wine and food to find .
Xiao Liu told that during the reconstruction of the Fengning City Evil Suppression Bureau, remnants of top-secret archive pages were discovered, and asked if I wanted to know what was written on them.
What else could it be about but the Yin Child? I was troubled over who to ask about this, but Xiao Liu delivered himself right to my doorstep.
Pretending extre curiosity, I let Xiao Liu tell all he knew without prompting.
As I expected, the Yin Child was indeed deliberately cultivated, and besides the Evil Suppression Bureau, the Taoist Sect and the Buddhist Sect were also involved, all three collaborating.
They fused the core yin objects dropped by five ghosts into the body of the Yin Child.
Listening to Xiao Liu speak, I finally understood why the Yin Child harbored such intense killing intent towards monks, Daoists, and governnt officers.
Also, when I first commanded the Yin Child and lost control at ho, the Yin Child once placed five bowls of rice on the dining table. Was it a morial for the five ghosts who provided the core yin objects?
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